3 tips on how to scale your contact center for the seasonal rush

This holiday season is expected to set records for ecommerce shopping. There will be a rise in customer interactions throughout the entire buyer’s cycle. To meet the demand, businesses will need to scale their technology and their people. But how can they do it? Here are three tips on how to scale your contact center for the seasonal rush.

1. Integrate with your ecommerce technology stack

Seamlessly connecting your contact center to ecommerce platforms, such as Shopify and BigCommerce, allows valuable information from customer interactions to quickly reach your customer service agents. With the right information at their fingertips, agents can automate and streamline their workflow during times of peak volume to improve customer satisfaction (CSAT) that is critical to long-term customer relationships.

Here are some of the advantages of integrating Talkdesk with your ecommerce technology provider of choice:

• Talkdesk has a simple setup, minimal ramp-up times and is easy to use. With one click, all existing contacts, orders and product details housed in your ecommerce stack can synchronize with Talkdesk.
• Agents can make and receive phone calls directly from their browser on any device alongside contextual information about the customer. 
• Emails, tickets, cases, chats and phone interactions from all integrated systems are displayed in the Talkdesk interface as the phone rings.
• Agents can create and update orders on the ecommerce platform directly from the Talkdesk interface. Also, when agents update customer information in the ecommerce platform, Talkdesk will automatically update as well.
• When the call is over, Talkdesk automatically populates the call recording and data into the customer’s activity feed.

2. Choose a cloud-native contact center technology

For effortless seasonal scaling, businesses need a contact center solution that is easy to use and requires minimum training, resulting in fast adoption.

Talkdesk CX Cloud™ is the first end-to-end solution for delivering a great customer experience (CX). Built on a modern cloud-native microservices architecture, Talkdesk CX Cloud provides the most comprehensive suite of contact center applications on a single cloud platform, including:

• Customer engagement applications to help organizations intelligently and cost-effectively interact with customers on the channel of their choice. This includes IVR, omnichannel, self-service and outbound.
• Workforce engagement applications to ensure teams are engaged, empowered and productive. This includes fully integrated agent desktop, mobile app, workforce management, quality management and call recording.
• Enterprise collaboration solutions that extend customer support beyond the walls of the contact center enabling access to subject matter experts across the company.
• AI and knowledge solutions to reduce cost and drive smarter, more efficient interactions. This includes applications for agent assistance, customer self-service, knowledge management, security monitoring, and even sourcing contact center talent.
• Analytics and insights to ensure peak operational performance, including flexible and intuitive real-time operational dashboards, BI tools and surveys.

3. Expand your team of agents to meet seasonal demand

Remote agents have become critical in 2020, and the holiday season will be no different. A team of remote contact center agents that can quickly come online during expected volume spikes will be the secret to an effective ecommerce holiday operation.

To help organizations scale for the seasonal rush, building remote teams faster and more efficiently without sacrificing on CX, Talkdesk CXTalent™ offers two unique ways to hire and grow your team of remote contact center agents:

• A CXTalent gig economy platform connects retailers and ecommerce businesses with certified contact center agents, supervisors, managers and system admins who possess a wide set of skills, experience and spoken languages.
• The CXTalent BPO partner program is a hands-on consultative service that evaluates staffing needs and pairs companies with vetted business process outsourcing (BPO) partners that best meet their requirements. All of the BPOs in the network have been hand-picked by Talkdesk to ensure you receive the best client service providers at preferred pricing.

However, recruiting new talent is only half of the equation. A modern, cloud-native workforce management solution can help you forecast demand, manage and optimize agent scheduling and maximize utilization. Simply put, that means having the right people in place, at the right time, servicing the right channels — so you can give your customers the best possible experience while keeping your staffing costs as low as possible. 

Talkdesk Workforce Management™ leverages powerful AI and automation to accurately anticipate changes in customer demand and ensure the right level of coverage. It’s uniquely designed to give you the flexibility you need to scale up and down during the holidays, with customizable shift templates and scheduling rules that support non-traditional work arrangements.

Everything these professionals do should be about succeeding with a full omnichannel communications engagement. They will be the front line of your customer service and the ones delighting your customers during shopping holidays and beyond.

Talkdesk offers a scalable platform and the flexibility to add seasonal licenses as needed. The technology is easy to implement, fully integrated and has a network for certified outsourcers available that can help you meet the demands of the seasonal rush.